As you are reading this, keep in mind that the writer is a Pakistani columnist.


Why Are Jews So powerful?

By: Dr Farrukh Saleem (The writer is an Islamabad-based freelance columnist)

There are only 14 million Jews in the world; seven million in the Americas, five million in Asia, two million in Europe and 100,000 in Africa. For every single Jew in the world there are 100 Muslims. Yet, Jews are more than a hundred times more powerful than all the Muslims put together.

Ever wondered why?

Jesus of Nazareth was Jewish. Albert Einstein, the most influential scientist of all time and TIME magazine’s ‘Person of the Century’, was a Jew.  Sigmund Freud – id, ego, and superego – the father of psychoanalysis was a Jew. So were Karl Marx, Paul Samuelson and Milton Friedman.

Here are a few other Jews whose intellectual output has enriched the whole humanity:
- Benjamin Rubin gave humanity the vaccinating needle. - Jonas Salk developed the first polio vaccine.
- Albert Sabin developed the improved live Polio vaccine.
- Gertrude Elion gave us a leukemia fighting drug.
- Baruch Blumberg developed the vaccination for Hepatitis B.
- Paul Ehrlich discovered a treatment for syphilis (a sexually transmitted disease).
- Elie Metchnikoff won a Nobel Prize in infectious diseases.
- Bernard Katz won a Nobel Prize in neuromuscular transmission.
- Andrew Schally won a Nobel in endocrinology (disorders of the endocrine system; diabetes, hyperthyroidism) …
- Aaron Beck founded Cognitive Therapy (psychotherapy to treat mental disorders, depression and phobias).
- Gregory Pincus developed the first oral contraceptive pill.
- George Wald won a Nobel for furthering our understanding of the human eye. 
- Stanley Cohen won a Nobel in embryology (study of embryos and their development) . 
- Willem Kolff came up with the kidney dialysis machine.

Over the past 105 years, 14 million Jews have won 15-dozen Nobel Prizes while only three Nobel Prizes have been won by 1.4 billion Muslims (other than Peace Prizes).

Why are Jews so powerful?
- Stanley Mezor invented the first micro-processing chip. - Leo Szilard developed the first nuclear chain reactor.
- Peter Schultz, optical fibre cable; 
- Charles Adler, traffic lights; 
- Benno Strauss, stainless steel; 
- Isador Kisee, sound movies; 
- Emile Berliner, telephone microphone and
- Charles Ginsburg, videotape recorder.

Famous financiers in the business world who belong to Jewish faith include Ralph Lauren (Polo), Levis Strauss (Levi’s Jeans), Howard Schultz (Starbuck’s) , Sergey Brin (Google), Michael Dell (Dell Computers), Larry Ellison (Oracle), Donna Karan (DKNY), Irv Robbins (Baskin & Robbins) and Bill Rosenberg (Dunkin Donuts).

Richard Levin, President of Yale University, is a Jew. So are Henry Kissinger (American Secretary of State), Alan Greenspan (Federal chairman under Reagan, Bush, Clinton and Bush), Joseph Lieberman, Madeleine Albright (American Secretary of State), Maxim Litvinov (USSR foreign Minister), David Marshal (Singapore’s first Chief Minister), Isaac Isaacs (Governor-General of Australia), Benjamin Disraeli (British statesman and author), Yevgeny Primakov (Russian PM), Jorge Sampaio (President of Portugal), Herb Gray (Canadian Deputy PM), Pierre Mendes (French PM), Michael Howard (British Home Secretary), Bruno Kreisky (Chancellor of Austria) and Robert Rubin  (former American Secretary of Treasury).

In the media, famous Jews include Wolf Blitzer (CNN), Barbara Walters (ABC News), Eugene Meyer (Washington Post), Henry Grunwald (Editor-in-Chief Time), Katherine Graham (publisher of The Washington Post), Joseph Lelyyeld (Executive Editor, The New York Times), and Max Frankel (New York Times).


Can you name the most beneficent philanthropist in the history of the world?

The name is George Soros, a Jew, who has so far donated a colossal $4 billion most of which has gone as aid to scientists and universities around the world.

Second to George Soros is Walter Annenberg, another Jew, who has built a hundred libraries by donating an estimated $2 billion.


At the Olympics, Mark Spitz set a record of sorts by winning seven gold medals. Lenny Krayzelburg is a three- time Olympic Gold Medallist. Spitz, Krayzelburg and Boris Becker are all Jewish.


Did you know that Harrison Ford, George Burns, Tony Curtis, Charles Bronson, Sandra Bullock, Billy Crystal, Woody Allen, Paul Newman, Peter Sellers, Dustin Hoffman, Michael Douglas, Ben Kingsley, Kirk Douglas, William Shatner, Jerry Lewis, Arch Jose Manosa and Peter Falk are all Jewish?


As a matter of fact, Hollywood itself was founded by a Jew. Among directors and producers, Steven Spielberg, Mel Brooks, Oliver Stone, Aaron Spelling ('Beverly Hills 90210’), Neil Simon ('The Odd Couple’), Andrew Vaina ('Rambo ½/3’), Michael Man ('Starsky and Hutch’), Milos Forman ('One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest’), Douglas Fairbanks ('The Thief of Baghdad’) and Ivan Reitman ('Ghostbusters’ ) are all Jewish.


To be certain, Washington is the capital that matters and in Washington the lobby that matters is The American Israel Public Affairs Committee, or AIPAC. Washington knows that if PM Ehud Olmert were to discover that the earth is flat, AIPAC will make the 109th Congress pass a resolution congratulating Olmert on his discovery.

William James Sidis, with an IQ of 250-300, is the brightest human who ever existed. Guess what faith did he belong to?

So, why are Jews so powerful?
Answer: Education.


Why are Muslims so powerless?
There are an estimated 1,476,233,470 Muslims on the face of the planet: one billion in Asia, 400 million in Africa, 44 million in Europe and six million in the Americas. Every fifth human being is a Muslim; for every single Hindu there are two Muslims, for every Buddhist there are two Muslims and for every Jew there are one hundred Muslims.

Ever wondered why Muslims are so powerless?
Here is why: There are 57 member-countries of the Organisation of Islamic Conference (OIC), and all of them put together have around 500 universities; one university for every three million Muslims. The United States has 5,758 universities and India has 8,407. In 2004, Shanghai Jiao Tong University compiled an 'Academic Ranking of World Universities’ , and intriguingly, not one university from the Muslim-majority states was in the top-500.

As per data collected by the UNDP, literacy in the Christian world stands at nearly 90 per cent and 15 Christian-majority states have a literacy rate of 100 per cent.

A Muslim-majority state, as a sharp contrast, has an average literacy rate of around 40 per cent and there is no Muslim-majority state with a literacy rate of 100 per cent.

Some 98 per cent of the 'literates’ in the Christian world had completed primary school, while less than 50 per cent of the 'literates’ in the Muslim world did the same.

Around 40 per cent of the 'literates’ in the Christian world attended university while no more than two per cent of the 'literates’ in the Muslim world did the same.


Muslim-majority countries have 230 scientists per one million Muslims. The US has 4,000 scientists per million and Japan has 5,000 per million.

In the entire Arab world, the total number of full-time researchers is 35,000 and there are only 50 technicians per one million Arabs (in the Christian world there are up to 1,000 technicians per one million). 

Furthermore, the Muslim world spends 0.2 per cent of its GDP on research and development, while the
Christian world spends around five per cent of its GDP.

Conclusion: The Muslim world lacks the capacity to produce knowledge.


Daily newspapers per 1,000 people and number of book titles per million are two indicators of whether knowledge is being diffused in a society.

In Pakistan, there are 23 daily newspapers per 1,000 Pakistanis while the same ratio in Singapore is 360. In the UK, the number of book titles per million stands at 2,000 while the same in Egypt is 20.

Conclusion: The Muslim world is failing to diffuse knowledge.


Exports of high technology products as a percentage of total exports are an important indicator of knowledge application. Pakistan’s exports of high technology products as a percentage of total exports stands at one per cent.

The same for Saudi Arabia is 0.3 per cent; Kuwait , Morocco , and Algeria are all at 0.3 per cent while Singapore is at 58 per cent.

Conclusion: The Muslim world is failing to apply knowledge.


Why are Muslims powerless?
Because they aren’t producing knowledge.

Why are Muslims powerless?
Because they aren’t diffusing knowledge.

Why are Muslims powerless?
Because they aren’t applying knowledge.

And, the future belongs to knowledge-based societies.

Interestingly, the combined annual GDP of 57 OIC-countries is under $2 trillion.
America, just by herself, produces goods and services worth $12 trillion; China $8 trillion,  Japan $3.8 trillion and  Germany $2.4 trillion (purchasing power parity basis).

Oil-rich Saudi Arabia, UAE, Kuwait and Qatar collectively produce goods and services (mostly oil) worth $500 billion; Spain alone produces goods and services worth over $1 trillion,
Catholic Poland $489 billion and Buddhist Thailand $545 billion. (Muslim GDP as a percentage of world’s GDP is fast declining).

So, why are Muslims so powerless?
Answer: Lack of education!…….

“The recent Israeli attacks on the flotilla carrying humanitarian aid to Gaza has sparked world wide protests & anger, not just in Muslim countries, but countries all over. For once, Israel can’t just hide or ignore the inhumane act’s they have committed; the world demands everything from them, even if the US doesn’t.

I’ve always been a believer in harmonious relations between all faiths,races,creeds, cultures, etc. Especially when it came to Muslims & Jews; our faiths are so similar, then why not be more cordial towards one another? Alas, such dreams & hopes are always crushed; every time i think it possible for us to forgive & forget & move on, something happens that won’t allow it.

The 2008 December invasion of Gaza, the brutal attack on Gaza by the Israeli army lead me to harbour hate, not against Israel as a whole, but against their government;yes, call me foolish, or even traitor to my Muslim community, but i’m still willing to believe that there are good Jews out there; humane Jew’s who have the same views as me, & i know there are. It brought me some comfort when some of the soldiers of the Israeli army came out, & told that they were ordered to use civilians as human shields. Does that not prove they bear a conscious ruled by concern for what is right & humane? Even after these attacks, i’m still willing to believe that there are Israelis who harbour the same dim hope that i do, the hope of for a better future for ‘us’. Must we always be so divided? Isn’t it bad enough the world is the horrible state that it is? Must we increase the hate around us? Must there always exist an ‘us’ & ‘them’, but never a ‘we’? You may argue that the Jews started it, that they asked for it, & hence we must retaliate, but is this really what we, as Muslims, as supposed to do?Some may say it is Jihad, that we must fight to protect our faith & our community, i argue are you even Muslim?

As Muslims, we are to believe that there is only One God, by the name of ALLAH, & Mohammad (pbuh), is his Messenger. If you, the Muslim reading this, solemnly swear that you believe in this, with all your heart & soul, but still feel that hate for Israel, then i’m sorry, but i cannot call you a fellow Muslim. We are expected to follow what is said in the Quran, & follow the example of the Prophet (pbuh), are we not? How can we say we’re doing that if we harbour this hate? The Prophet (pbuh), if he was still alive today to guide us, would never allow us to have such hate against those who are people of the Book, whom we must respect & be considerate of for that very reason. But more over, the Prophet (pbuh), would never have allowed us to have such hate, for it is against our faith; we are expected to be tolerant & forgiving,  not angry & vengeful. If you are a Muslim, then you should know the following incident:

The Prophets uncle, Hazrat Hamza, was a mighty warrior & protected & loved his nephew very much. One day, he was killed, by the slave of Hind, the woman who’s husband & father were killed in battle by Hazrat Hamza. In revenge, not only did she have him killed, she had his body brought to her, & mutilated it by cutting off his nose & ears to make a necklace.— If this was to happen to a human being you knew, irrespective of your relation to them, would you stand it? Of course not. But, following the conquest of Mecca, Hind & her slave were brought forward to the Prophet; do you know what he did? He forgave them, irrespective of what they did to his own uncle, he forgave them; he forgave all his enemies,who had for more than 20 years tortured & ridiculed him,his family & his followers; Hind & her slave embraced Islam; the whole of Mecca embraced Islam, & soon many came from far & wide to do the same.—It was his ability to forgive, to be so humane & kind, that not only made him worthy to be Prophet (pbuh), or to have that (Peace Be Upon Him) follow everytime he is mentioned, but helped Islam to spread, to prove that it is indeed a peaceful & truthful religion, & we, the followers, (or so we claim to be), are expected to follow the same example.

The Prophet, (PBUH), may no longer be alive in reality, but he can be alive, & to some extent is, through the kind & humane act’s of some Muslims; if we unite & follow his example of humility & humanity, then he,or our faith, will never be forgotten, questioned, or die in any way.

It is through us that our families name live, our nation’s name live, & our faith’s purity live; but if we are not pure, not willing to believe in the basic message, then how can we pass on what we so thoroughly believe in? How can we prove to the world that this is not a violent faith? Everytime you raise your right index finger during prayer; every time you go into Sajdah,& say Sub-han-ha-rabi-al-Allah, remember it is not just you worshipping the Almighty, but you & those before you, who so purely believed, worshipping with you.—We represent a rich history, a beautiful history as Muslims, let’s not forget it ourselves, let alone let the world forget it.